I can't hold it in forever. Eventually, I'd have to breathe. How did I let it get this far? How could I do a thing like that? Where was my conscience at? Everything comes to the light, comes the light…everything…
Jill Scott
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Ginny made a final scan through the desert menu before settling on a caramel swirl cheesecake.
"Order something. This is on me. Thank you for keeping Harry sane and occupied while I've been off at work. I really do appreciate it. It's good to know he's not chasing other witches while I'm off doing work for the Ministry. I figure he can't really have time to consider cheating on me, seeing as he's always working for you!" Ginny laughed.
"It's nothing at all Ginny," said Hermione, laughing along with her.
The waiter came up to the table and requested their desert order. Ginny placed her order then nodded to Hermione to decide on something.
"Just make it two please."
The waited nodded in acknowledgement and walked away from the table to fetch the last course of their lunch.
"So, my husband tells me that he started a little wager against Malfoy's program. Seems to me that he's not doing very well far. Draco is still in the program, isn't he?"
Hermione set down her wine glass and wiped the side of her mouth, "He is. He's doing extraordinarily well, actually. He's surpassed even my expectations."
"Malfoy!? Draco Malfoy? The ferret? We are talking about the same man here, aren't we?" Ginny appeared to be in a state of disbelief and shock.
"We are. I don't know Gin. I think that something about being out of the eyes of his father and his peers has caused him to explore a new side of himself that's always been there; he just hasn't been able to embrace it until now."
"I don't know. It seems hard to believe that he could ever get along with muggles, much less live amongst them. Even I thought he'd have failed out by now."
Their deserts arrived. They took a few silent moments to enjoy their first bite.
"Great choice," complimented Hermione as she passed the fork through her lips for a second bite.
"I know, right? The deserts are the reason I come here. So," Ginny rested her elbows on the table as she fully savored the decadent treat in front of her, "Tell me what your secret it."
"Hmm?" Hermione had a full bite in her mouth. She quickly swallowed, "What secret?"
"I know that you've intervened with your participants before, in past cases, in order to make sure they succeeded. I also know that you only do that for severe cases, and Malfoy is as severe of a case if there ever was one. So, what strings did you pull to make things work out for Draco?"
"I never said that I-"
"Department of Mysteries, Hermione." Ginny cut her off with a simple explanation for how she knew.
"Oh right. Well then, I guess there's no sense in lying is there?"
"Absolutely not. Besides, I'm your best friend. I know you." Ginny arched her eyebrows suspiciously at her best friend, knowing she was holding a secret that she was eager to pry out of her.
Hermione quickly finished her last bite of cheesecake and then sighed. "Fine, I'll admit it. I've been intervening."
"How?"
"Polyjuice potion."
Ginny held back a gasp of excitement, more so than surprise. The idea of Hermione of being so tricky and deceitful with her own work was a juicy truth to hear. "What do you mean? What have you been doing?"
"If I tell you, you have to stay quiet about it. You can't tell Harry anything, not a word. I don't care if you are married."
"I promise. Not a word," swore Ginny, miming zipped up lips.
"I got hired at Draco's workplace-"
"-How?" interrupted Ginny.
Hermione had a look that said 'really?' "Draco was hired there, believe me, it wasn't difficult."
Ginny laughed, "Okay, I guess that makes sense. What does he do?"
"He's working as waiter and I've done a few odd jobs before to help out my participants. It helps me keep an eye on them and see what they're really up to. No one shows their true colors in front of a ministry officer. You have to observe them when they don't know their being watched to know their true progress."
"That is true."
"So, something unexpected happened…" she paused for a moment and wondered if it was wise of her to confess her whole façade. She really needed someone to talk to and she trusted Ginny explicitly.
"Tell! Don't hold back. What happened?" The hesitation made her anxious to hear more.
"Draco developed a bit of a crush on my character," hurriedly admitted Hermione. "A really strong one, in fact; I think he might be falling in love with Megan."
"Who's Megan?"
"The woman I'm pretending to be."
"Wait, so you're saying that Draco Malfoy thinks that he's in love with a muggle?"
"That's correct."
Ginny looked like she had just found a satchel of money lying in the street, free for the taking. "I don't even believe you. That's too rich! What did you do to make that happen? Sleep with him!?"
Ginny had only been joking but the deep shade of red on Hermione's face sold her out before she could defend herself.
"Oh Holy Merlin! No, you didn't…Hermione Granger, tell me you didn't!" exclaimed Ginny.
"Shhh, Gin, keep your voice down. You'll attract attention." Hermione buried her face into her hands.
"Tell me you were drunk at least? You were naked, then you tripped and fell on him? It was an accident right?" Ginny tried to help her friend rationalize it but she wasn't helping.
"I can't talk about," Hermione tried to change the topic.
"Uh…you can and you have to," pressed her best friend. "I mean, it was just a one-time thing right? Nothing serious?"
"Yeah, it wasn't planned or anything. It just kind of happened. I lost myself."
"Maybe you've been lonelier than you'd like to admit since you broke off your engagement with my brother?"
Even though it didn't really matter anymore, she couldn't refrain herself from correcting her. "He broke it off, not me. But yes, I think you have a point. Maybe I need to take some time away from work now and then and actually date. If I was able to sleep with Malfoy then I must really be in need of a good shag."
"Desperately," agreed Ginny. "Don't worry love, your secret is safe with me."
"You promise not to tell anyone?" Hermione felt paranoid now that her secret was out in the open. Emotionally, she wanted to reach out and grab it back, but it was too late.
"I swear it. I support you intervening. Draco needs a major personality make over, and I wouldn't mind my husband losing a bet for once. Just make sure you don't get too involved with your work again if you know what I mean?"
"Agreed."
/
After a late evening meal, Draco returned home for the night. His legs were mildly sore from all of the walking but it felt good, it felt productive. He threw his leftovers into the fridge, stripped off his clothes and jumped in to the shower.
He forgot to grab a change of clothes before he went in to bathe and was forced to face the cold air in the nude. He scrambled into his bedroom and tripped on his way to the dresser. The bed caught his fall. He cursed out loud as he reached down to the ground to see what he had tripped on.
Draco turned pale upon discovering the item he had so clumsily tripped over.
It was a wand.
"What the fuck…"
He couldn't wrap mind around the truth of the moment and could hardly believe what he was holding onto.
There was no possible way.
It wasn't his wand, and he seriously doubted Granger would bait him with magic to cause him to fail out of the program. Even though it seemed like the easiest explanation to accept, he didn't even believe that Potter would do that to him. His failure made them both look bad whether he wanted to admit it or not.
The wand had been lying in the same place Megan's cloth had been strewn the night before. It wasn't possible for it to belong to her. He knew that she was a muggle. He had gone through emotional trenches to accept that face and pass through it in order to act on his affections towards her. There was no way this wand belonged to her.
'Who else could it be?' Draco thought to himself, realizing the difficult truth that he'd been deceived.
Draco didn't know how to take this news. If she was a witch then he wouldn't have to fully deal with the conflict of letting himself fall for a muggle. What if she was a muggle-born? Did that matter to him still? He started to realize that maybe he didn't know anything about her.
Was it possibly someone else knew about all of this? What if the Ministry had a way to find out? What if Granger and Potter didn't believe him that he didn't know she was a witch? He had agreed to have zero contact with the wizarding world with the exception of the ministry officers. This misunderstanding could mean an Azkaban sentence for him.
As much as he really liked Megan, he wasn't going to risk his freedom to find out how much. He wrapped the wand up in a red hand towel and set it outside of his front door, hidden behind a bush.
'I'm really sorry to end things like this, but I've made a mistake. Your stuff is outside my front door behind the bush. I can't explain. Please, don't contact me ever again. I'm sorry.'
It pained him to send the message but he had to do it before he gave himself time to think about it. He wanted this girl, but he had to think of his own situation first. She was too dangerous now that he knew the truth about the woman who had clearly bewitched him.
Then it hit him; what if she had literally bewitched him? What if that was the true reason he fell for her so hard and fast? Was she the kind of witch that took advantage of muggle men? He'd heard of desperate woman enchanting muggle men for their own satisfaction and amusement before, in order to satisfy their desires and loneliness. Is this what it felt like to be abused by magic? He quickly transitioned from hurt to enraged. He honestly never wanted to see her again.
Draco resisted the urge to punch his fist through the wall and forced himself to go to bed before he did something he knew he would regret.
/
Hermione had just finished rifling through her office for the fifth time when her phone buzzed.
It was Draco.
Just what she needed to top of her stress level.
She opened and read the message. What she read was not what she had been expecting.
"Oh my god, what…" she scrambled for her flask then remembered she was out of polyjuice potion until she found her wand and had the time to brew a new batch.
Thinking on her feet she did her best to cast a wand-less disillusionment charm and made her way to the floo network.
As soon as she reached the base, she practically ran out the front door on her way to Draco's place.
There was a neatly wrapped towel protruding from the corner of the bush near his front door. With shaking hands she slowly pulled it out and unraveled it.
She had found her wand.
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A/N: The lesson of this chapter: Don't Tell Lies! Everybody is going to find out the truth about everything all the time...always. Something like that... Anyway, thanks for reading and for reviewing! I love hearing your reactions because I can't see you when you're reading the story to know what you're thinking! (Wouldn't that be creepy if I could? I bet most of you are indecent when you're reading anyway...*SMH* tsk tsk) Anywho, I'll do my best to update again when I get a free hour. My schedule is pretty full with school atm but this is my little recreational escape. See you next chapter!